An unimpressive monster is usually the death knell for a creature feature, and the amorphous predator at the center of Mitchell Altieri’s Consumed doesn’t do the movie any favors. Still, thanks in part to screenwriter David Calbert and a solid cast, this couples camping horror succeeds on the levels most crucial to its existence: psychological tension and body trauma metaphor.
Consumed is sprinkled with shaky-cam nightmare sequences whose production values look strictly straight-to-video. These scenes establish the terrors that eat at Beth (Courtney Halverson), literally. She’s haunted by memories of being strapped to a metal bed, wearing nothing but a hospital gown, her left breast gone. There’s also a beast in her dreams wrapping her torn body up in grotesque talons.
This fuzzy recollection is in contrast to exquisitely photographed nature scenes. You see, Beth and her husband, Jay (Mark Famiglietti), are taking a camping trip for their wedding anniversary. Jay is worried that Beth can’t handle it, offering to carry her heavy pack up a tricky climb, but although he means well, Beth’s motivation for taking the trip requires a different kind of support: she wants to know that she can take care of herself again.
The couple’s already tense marital adventure is shattered when they’re pursued by the beast from her dreams, and this is when the strong set-up starts to flag. The CGI creature is a puff of black smoke with an occasionally steady form, and while Altieri doesn’t let us see the beast in full right away, it’s not a huge payoff when we do.
While Jay is injured, Beth runs for help, but just before the creature gets her, mysterious woodsman Quinn (Devon Sawa) whisks her out of trouble. Quinn takes Beth and Jay in—but is he really to be trusted?
The skin-eating monster at the center of Consumed seems to be the movie’s reason for being, and by that standard, it’s a failed horror movie (so far, audience opinion seems to agree). But the naturalistic elements are so well done and the couple’s dynamic so well played, that the best way to approach the movie is to view it as a character study. Beth seems tentative at first, but that’s the nature of her coming to terms with her body after breast cancer. She comes more into her own after her husband is injured, and she is the one forced to keep them alive. Sawa is, as always, a good creep, and his own relationship to the beast dovetails with Beth’s. Of course, the creature is a manifestation of her tumor, and if that’s an obvious ploy, it gives the relationship more to chew on. Not all couples face the kind of woodland crisis that Beth and Jay confront, but can they handle a different kind of crisis?
Ultimately, Consumed is about more than just a body under attack, but a relationship under attack, as well. As horror movies go, the resolution is anti-climactic, but as the relationship goes, it’s a touching endorsement of mutual support. If the monster were better designed—or maybe less visible—Consumed would be a remarkable marital drama. But this design flaw may well point to a richer theme: the real world’s troubles are just as formidable as the shapeless things that go bump in the night.
Photo courtesy of Brainstorm Media
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